Binary/Transcript
Transcript Text reads: The Mysteries of Life with Tim and Moby Tim is making notes on a handheld PDA. MOBY: Beep. Moby runs into the room. TIM: Hey, easy there. Tim reads from a typed letter. TIM: Dear Tim and Moby, what is binary? From, Miles (Miami). Most of us use digital machines like calculators and computers almost every day, but very few of us understand the basics of how they work. MOBY: Beep. The numbers one through nine appear on the screen, then four columns appear: 1,000s, 100s, 10s and 1s. The numbers three, five, two, and six drop into their respective columns. TIM: The binary system is what computing devices use at the most basic level to represent and store data. These are the numbers that most people use. It's a base-10 number system, and using these 10 symbols we can write down any number imaginable. Like three thousand, five hundred, twenty six. Moby holds up his fingers and a picture of two hands appears. TIM: Our numbering system is probably base-10 because we have 10 fingers to count on. A zero and a one appear on the screen. TIM: The binary system is base-2, using only two symbols, a zero and a one. Now why do you think that is? Here, I'll give you a hint. MOBY: Beep. Tim removes one of Moby's lights and keeps clicking it, turning the light on and off. TIM: That's right. One of the simplest electrical circuits is a switch representing on and off, yes and no, empty and full, and one and zero. An image of crisscrossing lines with yellow stripes appears, representing signals in binary code. TIM: Computers use switches like fingers to count on, passing around electrical signals in binary code. Moby looks down at the hole in his chest where his light used to be. TIM: Oh, I know what you’re thinking. But Tim? How does this strange binary system work? I'll show you. A screen appears with circles on the bottom and the numbers 256, 128, 64, 32, 16, 8, 4, 2, and 1. A base-10 box appears at the top. TIM: Binary works with powers of two and marking them either one meaning on or zero meaning off. The circles at the bottom of the screen turn yellow representing on and off. TIM: Here's the number one. A one appears in the top strip. The numbers 0001 appear in the binary strip, and the far right button representing one turns yellow. TIM: Notice that the light representing one is on. That means there is one 1 in the number one. MOBY: Beep. TIM: Yea, trying a larger number might make more sense. Let's try 25. The screen with place values reappears. TIM: Using our number system, 25 would be described as two tens and five ones. The two appears in the tens column and the five appears in the ones column. The binary screen reappears and the buttons for 16, 8, and 1 turn yellow. TIM: 25 in binary would look like this. The numbers 1;1;0;0;1 appear in the binary strip. TIM: That’s the numbers 16, an 8, no 4s, no 2s, and a 1. TIM: 16 plus 8 plus 1 equals 25. Each button lights up as Tim speaks. TIM: Now I know this binary system sounds pretty complicated compared to the one we're all used to, but computers are so fast they can handle it with no sweat. Watch this. Hey Moby, what's 8,243,161 times 2,003,527? MOBY: Beep. TIM: See? An image of a computer desktop shows files being moved around. TIM: All the data your computer uses is stored in binary at the most basic level. Sure, it may look like all files and folders and desktop patterns, but way down deep it’s just a bunch of ons and offs. A screen appears with many lines of ones and zeros moving across it. Tim holds a keyboard and a mouse. TIM: The keys you type, the movements of your mouse, even the sound of my voice, are all represented by binary code. I, uh, guess we're all done here. Moby taps Tim on the shoulder. He snatches his light back from Tim. TIM: Oh, hey, sorry about that, I just--- OW! OW! OW! OW! OW! OW! Moby is pulling Tim's arm. MOBY: Beep. TIM: I promise I'll never pull anything off you again! MOBY: Beep. Category:BrainPOP Transcripts Category:BrainPOP Math Transcripts Category:BrainPOP Engineering & Technology Transcripts